The growing speed of product development (with shorter time to market, rapid addition of new product features and transformation of many products due to technological change) makes the ability to measure and deal with complexity considerably more difficulty. The rate of product evolution in many product categories has become faster than ever, so measurement methods must evolve to keep pace with the speed and scope of business decision making. Unfortunately, it still generally takes 30 days or more to run many types of meaningful studies in areas like human factors product testing, market research and product field trials. Such labor-intensive studies, conducted by degreed professionals, are also expensive. Since many product design decisions will not wait or do not have the budget, they are made without the benefit of in-depth customer-based studies that would make those decisions clearer, simpler and more accurate.
In some areas current test methods are immature and only partly assist in making crucial product decisions. For example, a growing number of software and computer-integrated products (which may actually be built around a special purpose computer such as a medical monitor) aim to enhance customer performance, problem solving abilities and complex types of thinking. While learning tests are able to determine whether or not a product's users have learned the procedures for using that product, it remains difficult to assess complex thinking skills and changes in attitude toward one's tasks. Those effects must be inferred instead of measured, forcing decision makers to make crucial product decisions based on guesses instead of knowledge.
In other areas it is extremely difficult to obtain action and behavioral information during the actual use of products, services and information systems. From design and business decision making viewpoints this is essential for understanding how products or processes perform across the spectrum of situations and countries to learn their capabilities and deficiencies for actually achieving the goals for which they are purchased. There is a larger, more advanced reason that this information is required now that embedded microprocessors and software are increasingly transforming products, services and the information infrastructures used to operate many types of organizations. In-depth measurement and data are needed to dynamically trigger automatic and appropriate responses and reconfigurations in response to rapidly changing conditions and swiftly evolving situations.
In a growing number of product categories and industries one key to success is improving the full range of outcomes required by customers for their success. For example, the entire computing industry has been judged harshly for failing to significantly improve productivity measures. Similarly, the medical industry struggles to learn how to provide quality care with a lower cost-per-patient outcome. Such transformations in performance require simultaneous improvements by vendors, customers and everyday product users, which requires systemic and systematic measurement and dynamic adaptation across products, organizations, industries, markets and societies. The immediate availability of accurate and meaningful decision making and reconfiguration information is essential for improving products, business decisions and competitive performance with the speed and scale that are required by today's competitive pressures and societies.
This broad range of needs clearly calls for faster, easier, more direct and broader means for learning customer requirements, measuring actual performance, communicating that information in automatically analyzed formats, and responding to customers and users dynamically based on their group or individual objectives and performance measurements.
This Customer-Based Product Design Module invention uses a combination of computer hardware, software and communications technologies to construct a module that is built into certain products and services, to establish a network of customer-vendor-distributor interactions and communications (or a network of internal organization-wide interactions in the area of computer-based performance). These make possible new customer and user roles in the design and development of products and services, and customer-vendor relationships. Over time, this may produce a gradual transfer to customers of commercial direction and market control, both in individual cases (such as the evolution of a particular product) and in aggregate, from vendors and distributors.
One of the core purposes of the invention is illustrated in FIG. 15. This is the ability to learn interactively and iteratively from the users of products and information systems anywhere in the world while they are in use—without having to travel to their sites (or without having to bring them to a testing laboratory). Since this is a two-way link, it also offers the ability to respond meaningfully to customers and users based on worldwide, local, organizational or individual needs regardless of where they are located.
Information technology is so new that we're still figuring out what it is and what it should do for us. This technology turns the user interfaces in products, equipment, tools and toys into an interactive learning system that connects vendors, users and marketplaces worldwide. While this emerges from the built-in computing that is becoming an increasingly common part of many products, it transforms the product interface into a learning device and a learning system—for individual products, for marketplaces and potentially, for societies and economic systems.
Product interfaces are increasingly connected to built-in or embedded computing. These interfaces already surround people at work and at home on equipment (whether in business offices, doctor's offices, factories, construction sites, hospitals, etc.), computers, consumer electronics and more. These interfaces are moving into pockets and briefcases via handheld electronic organizers and PDAs (personal digital assistants). They are transforming millions of computer and TV screens via interactive services and channels. Picture a new module behind interfaces around the world. This enables them to “wake up” when these products and services are used so they ask questions based on how they are used. The module stores user answers and uploads them periodically, and its overall architecture delivers a clear and broad picture of the current state and evolutionary changes in individual and group needs. The module/architecture of this invention also downloads into products new questions, user support, or other new capabilities so that product interfaces provide continuous two-way learning, and users receive new information or features that can be delivered through the product itself.
This may help transform the increasingly everyday environment of built-in computing into a two-way system for meeting both vendor and customer needs faster, more accurately and more effectively. Since this technology is scaleable, it doesn't matter whether the focus is:                One vendor's product in one customer's hands,        All of that vendor's products in use in one country,        The marketplace for those types of products in that country, or        Multiple markets around the world.        
Since this through-the-product communications may be used to transform customer-vendor relationships, results may include:                Products that can learn from and work with individuals or groups in new ways, or        Markets that employ these new built-in communications/information systems to provide new benefits such as additional market efficiencies, built-in marketwide user performance support systems, or accelerated economic growth for individual vendors or national economies.        
Everyone talks back to products, but not with words they can repeat in public. Think how customers would guide products and services toward what they want if they could really talk back while they use a product, both when they have a problem and when they have an unmet need. Vendors might find an alive marketplace that helps them improve products, services and business relationships.
A number of service industries, such as market research and product testing, seek to help vendors understand their customers. This invention may enable vendors to learn directly from their customers on an ongoing basis and establish a private two-way product development relationship with them, providing a valuable addition to some current methodologies. This invention may also produce more accurate information than these measurement services because it works with larger numbers of customers, in many more markets and market niches, to learn their needs, expectations and desires during the actual everyday use of products and services.
How does this invention accomplish this? Today, microprocessors are often embedded into products as controllers. For example, many new cars have a dozen or more microprocessors inside of them. This invention uses technology to embed a customer-vendor-distributor NETWORKING MODULE into vendor-selected products and services. This technology-based Module turns the product's interface into a two-way learning device, connected to a larger learning system and architecture, so that rapid and iterative customer-based progress may become a feature of those products, services and markets. Because learning, measurement and performance improvement are interconnected, this new feature may involve customers (as individuals, in groups and marketwide) in the product evaluation and design process, and in planning business services so that they serve customer needs better than competitors can accomplish. These are strategic advantages for companies, societies and economic systems.
For products (and information systems) that contain this Module, customers may continuously inform vendors (or developers) of their current and emerging needs. The vendors of those products may have the best opportunity to respond swiftly to a much clearer view of customer problems, product problems and market opportunities than they have today. The inventor believes that within a generation it will be normal for many products and services to include this type of Module, so that customers (in aggregate, the market) comes to play a larger role in directing and controlling the commercial development of many products and services.
The closest known prior art is a combination of six areas. When combined, these six areas represent the prior art for this invention:
1 Market Research
Product and service vendors invest considerable money, employee time and corporate credibility to create their products and services. Are they as successful as they want to be? The market research industry has sprung up to answer a host of questions about customers. It is obvious that in spite of these market research efforts, customer needs that remain unknown and unfilled provide constant opportunities for creating and launching new products and services. In addition, many customers use products and services in ways that are not anticipated or fully understood by market researchers.
Why doesn't market research provide greater understanding? In market research, a variety of methodologies are used to segment groups of customers and to show the preferences and desires of the market segments. Typically, market research focuses on gathering either quantitative data (such as demographic information or numerical responses to surveys and questionnaires) or qualitative data (such as from focus groups). One of the main limitations of these research studies is that they are usually separate from the customers' actual and everyday use of the products and services being investigated.
2 On-line Surveys
In an on-line survey, a subject sits in front of a computer. Generally, this means bringing the subject to the computer that is running the survey software. At the time the subject has been told to complete the on-line survey, the survey software is run and it asks the subject questions. The subject uses a keyboard or mouse to answer the questions. The software records the subject's answers in a data file. After that subject has completed the survey, the software can report those answers. After all the subjects have been run, software can report various compilations of the data set, and provide various analyses of an individual subject, a sub-set of subjects, the entire group, or comparisons between various sub-groups. Over time, a series of on-line surveys can be compiled, and the data may be compared in various ways (such as longitudinally).
3 Field Programmable Logic Devices
Engineers now able to rapidly produce unique, custom programmed chips in their offices using “desktop silicon foundries.” An engineer uses a personal computer or workstation to design the chip with commercially available software. A blank chip, in a special box attached to the desktop computer, is programmed in a few minutes. This is by far the fastest and cheapest way to create custom chips that add custom features to products. When a chip design is finished, if only a small number are needed, copies can be made in that “desktop silicon foundry.” If many of these custom chips are needed, they can be mass produced in a factory.
4 Hand-held Bar Code Readers
These devices are carried into the field by many types of employees, such as couriers for organizations like Federal Express. These devices gather data from individual products or transactions by means of reading printed bar codes. This data is held in the bar code reader until it is connected to a computer or to a device that communicates with a computer. At that time, function keys are pressed and the bar code reader's data is uploaded to the computer. During that same connection, function keys are pressed and the bar code reader may be reprogrammed by means of downloading new software into the bar code reader's memory.
5 The Calculator
The small, hand-held calculator contains a microprocessor, memory, display, power supply and input buttons. It can be mass manufactured in large enough quantities that these devices can be sold very inexpensively.
6 Smart Cards
The Smart Card is like a calculator with additional memory and functions built into it. It is used for many types of applications, such as electronic ID systems that provide secure access throughout corporate offices, maintaining personal medical or financial account histories, and other single-purpose uses. A number of the prior art for Smart Cards and related devices demonstrate the feasibility of the present invention, including:                (a) Systems for storing and transferring data between persons based on portable electronic devices (U.S. Pat. No. 4,007,355, February 1977, Moreno and U.S. Pat. No. 4,092,524, May 1978, Moreno),        (b) A portable element of reservation systems, for receiving, storing, displaying and outputting digital data (U.S. Pat. No. 4,298,793, November 1981, Melis et al.),        (c) A credit card with a memory, including plural memory fields, for keeping accounts with predetermined homogeneous units (U.S. Pat. No. 4,367,402, January 1983, Giraud et al.),        (d) A data processing card system that may be carried by a user for insertion into external terminal devices, which actuates the data processing card system (U.S. Pat. No. 4,539,472, September 1985, Poetker et al.),        (e) A system for transferring electronic funds by means of portable modules which connect to resident units for transferring data between units or to a central computer (U.S. Pat. No. 4,625,276, November 1986, Benton et al.),        (f) An apparatus that accepts data from a people monitoring system (which is attached to a television set), stores the data and transmits it to a removable local unit that stores it (U.S. Pat. No. 4,642,685, February 1987, Roberts et al.),        (g) A voice recording card can record and reproduce messages, and transmit and receive messages (U.S. Pat. No. 4,677,657, June 1987, Nagata et al.),        (h) An IC card for operating machines such as automatic cash machines and ID systems, including a display for displaying stored data, an IC card reader for reading the IC card, and transmitting/receiving means for updating the data (U.S. Pat. No. 4,746,787, May 1988, Suto et al.),        (i) An intelligent card that includes a keyboard, display and IC chip, designed to provide secure identification of the card's holder (U.S. Pat. No. 4,749,982, June 1988, Rikuna et al.),        (j) A customer service system that stores customer service information in an IC card, and displays it on the card's display, based on menu selections by the person holding the card (U.S. Pat. No. 4,752,677, June 1988, Nakano et al.),        (k) An IC card system compatible with a bank account system, including account maintenance, money transfers and the functions of credit and debit cards (U.S. Pat. No. 4,839,504, June 1989, Nakano),        (l) A portable data carrier that stores more than one bank and/or credit account number and data, and provides account information by means of a display (U.S. Pat. No. 4,859,837, August 1989, Halpern),        (m) An intelligent portable interactive personal data system (U.S. Pat. No. 4,868,376, September 1989, Lessin et al.),        (n) A smart card apparatus and method of programming it, including a smart card control program and a data dictionary (U.S. Pat. No. 4,874,935, October 1989, Younger),        (o) A method and system for using facsimile machines to perform electronic funds transfer (U.S. Pat. No. 4,960,981, November 1990, Benton, et al.),        (p) A portable electronic keysafe system (e.g., a secure lock) that stores data, along with a stand to interface with a computer, and a computer that programs the lock (U.S. Pat. No. 4,988,987, January 1991, Barrett et al.),        (q) A data collection system useful for trade shows employing a card containing a memory chip for recording and storing the data of individuals (U.S. Pat. No. 5,019,697, May 1991, Postman), and        (r) A portable interactive medical test selector that displays questions to a patient, stores answers and analyzes the answers to recommend appropriate medical tests (U.S. Pat. No. 5,025,374, June 1991, Roizen et al.).        
This invention combines the prior art in a new distributed system whose components reside:                In products (as defined by this invention),        At vendors, and        Throughout the marketplace or throughout an enterprise (when built into its internal business and computing systems).        
Some of its technology parallels include:                Bank Automated Teller Machines (ATMs), in which simplified local interactions with individual customers are linked to centralized systems via marketwide networks, to provide immediate personal services across markets and large geographic regions.        Automobile racing, in which key systems of a race vehicle are monitored by sensors, and combined with direct voice communications with the driver, to gain the clearest possible computer display and understanding of the driver's problems and needs, and to gain the new competitive abilities of supporting the driver so that the driver has the best possible chance to perform better than competitors.        The worldwide telephone network and linked voice mail systems, in which individual local users, who may be located anywhere, operate the global phone network and attached voice mail systems with a small keypad of ten numbers (0–9) and two buttons (# and *), illustrating how a simple means for a user to interface with a product or service may control and communicate with complex systems that are widely distributed.        
What Are Products and Services?
The departure from this prior art comes from fundamental re-definitions: Physical products and many types of services are really high-level concepts that use specific physical designs of products and service concepts to engage customers and attempt to satisfy their needs, desires and expectations. This is inevitably imprecise, and customers flexibly and individually determine how they will use the products and services that they buy. Thus, any one embodiment of a physical design is temporary and subject to improvements, even though it may look permanent at any one moment.
Vendors typically use market research to discover unfilled user needs and create new product and service designs that might capture valuable market share. The resulting physical products and services are therefore the current conceptual embodiment of a vendor's current knowledge of customer and user needs. As this knowledge is improved, the physical and process designs of products and services are altered. Thus, we propose that the current designs of products and services at any time are a reflection of a vendor's knowledge of customer needs and desires.
A second redefinition is that the current concept of a product life cycle may become less precise and less meaningful as product markets become information markets. The core transformation is from a product development stage followed by a product launch stage and one or more sales campaigns with occasional product improvements when needed to meet sales and revenue objectives. As enabled by this invention, the initial development stage increasingly interpenetrates all other stages of the product life cycle, the operations of corporations, and the evolution of economic systems (i.e., capitalist economies).
As envisioned by this invention, as customers and vendor employees interact to produce continuous improvement, the marketplace may be e-engineered into an interactive development environment (i.e., research and development environment, or R&D environment) with a national or global scope. The opportunities for accelerated learning may transform:                The ability of an individual corporation to satisfy the needs of its customers,        If that company gains competitive advantages that produce additional market share, or other meaningful advantages, similar in-product communications may be adopted by competing companies, which may transform the industry or the marketplace,        As the industry or marketplace evolves to interact with its customers, the fundamental efficiencies of those markets and those industries may increase.        As the continuous improvement capabilities of particular industries in particular countries grow, the global market share of those industries and countries may transform the leading companies in those industries worldwide.        
Because of the embedding of microprocessors and computing into products, some of the types of industries that may be affected include computers, software, electronics, communications, interactive entertainment, multimedia, transportation, energy, farm equipment, avionics, medical equipment, scientific instruments, etcperceivable or measurable improvements may include customers receiving more of what they really want to buy for each dollar they spend, faster product evolution based on customer needs, increased market shares for companies that are more responsive to customer desires and more able to assist customers in achieving their goals, etc.
Thus, a technology may lead to organizational and market efficiencies that empirically improve the efficiency and effectiveness of capitalist markets. In Adam Smith's terms, the “invisible hand” of the market may be rendered “visible,” accelerating the evolution of human welfare by providing greater benefits from free choice and personal freedom. In sum, the redefinitions intended may simultaneously be technological, operational (for products, organizations and economies) and political.
Today there are many approaches to competitiveness and the cost of failing to find a successful approach has mushroomed For example, some world-class corporations use new technologies to capture market share. Others use a constant launching and churning of new product models to attack their competitors' customer-vendor relationships.
This invention focuses on the competitive strategy of having companies work in a partnership with their customers to gain the greatest ability to concentrate their scarce resources on developing the products and markets that customers want most, and on serving customers in the ways that are most valuable to customers, so that these companies gain the largest increases in sales and profits. It suggests that the value of these customer-vendor relationships may be a central business advantage at this point in the emergence of a global information age, and this advantage may be explicitly captured by engaging in new types of product development partnerships that may be made possible by this invention.
Needs for This Invention
(Note: this invention's terminology is defined at the beginning of the Preferred Embodiment.)
Simply put, this invention helps vendors and customers by transforming their learning cycle: It compresses the time and steps between setting business objectives, creating effective products and services, and improving them continuously. It also alters their roles: Customers become partners in the improvement process along with vendors and distributors.
This invention's “Customer-Based Product Design Module” (CB-PD Module) generates numerous opportunities for improvements by integrating customers and employees into the design and delivery of products and services as a continuous process. The invention describes a specific new class of product feature that may be added to, or built into, many types of products and services. The CB-PD Module engages Customers in Development Interactions (DI) while products and services are being used. The customers and users provide direct, on-task understanding of their use of the products and services, and of their unfilled needs, to the product vendors, designers and developers Development Interactions (DI) will take place most often during actual uses of the product or service, which is when most unreported problems and dissatisfactions occur. The results of these Development Interactions (DI) clarify customer needs, improve products, and they may also help solve problems, control costs, and improve services and operations.
Because it automates this process and adds networking to many types of products and services, this invention may help change the cost, economics, methods and desirability of involving customers in the design and evolution of products and services. By automating this process, there are new opportunities to produce valuable customer-based information that may become low in cost and constantly available. This might transform the overall learning cycle, the very process by which products and services can be improved continuously in the future. In other words, if your customers and users are telling you directly what has value to them and what doesn't, this becomes a way to manage a business better, to select priorities more responsively, to budget scarce capital and human resources more accurately, to target the points where one's products and services make the most difference to customers, and to increase the company's revenues and profits faster than competitors.
With this CB-PD Module, because of the new customer-vendor partnerships and learning cycle it creates, the result is a different learning cycle based on new kinds of interactive feedback from customers. Over time, if one or more general purpose CB-PD Modules can be productized and modularized for rapid and affordable insertion into appropriate products and services, that will decrease its cost, accelerate the learning process for many companies, and expand management's ability to work directly with their customers to provide valuable new benefits faster than they are able to today.
From this invention's viewpoint, critical management decisions spring from the fact that vendors invest considerable money, employee time and effort to create and market their products and services. One of a vendor's most important questions is, “How can our currently available resources be leveraged to jump faster and farther toward our goals?” Potential opportunities exist at two levels. There are local decisions, such as how to design or improve a specific product or service. There are also system decisions, such as how to prioritize the relative value of different product and service investment opportunities. With multiple opportunities and limited resources, how can vendors continually identify the best available opportunities for investing in products and services, and for choosing their specific features and user interfaces?
Answering these types of questions, to improve the management of businesses, the quality of products and the satisfaction of customers, are some of the core purposes of this invention.